


They Say This is How it Begins

by ajarofgoodthings



Series: the future is forgiven [1]
Category: Reign, The Tudors
Genre: F/M, Mentions of Infant Death, Mentions of miscarriage, Prequel, Setup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-12
Updated: 2016-05-12
Packaged: 2018-06-08 01:06:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6832579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ajarofgoodthings/pseuds/ajarofgoodthings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"How do we forgive ourselves for all the things we did not become?"</p><p>The backstory buildup of England; the hopes and dreams of a young King never meant for the Throne and a Queen meant for his brother.</p><p>'Simply to Endure' is a modern Tudors AU, where timelines are compressed so Mary Queen of Scots is Henry VIII's niece instead of grandniece. 'They Say This is How it Begins,' is, timeline wise, the first installment in the series, but can be read with or without its companion pieces, 'What Do We Do With the Dead Things We Carry?' and 'Of Bulldogs and Babies,'</p>
            </blockquote>





	They Say This is How it Begins

**Author's Note:**

> **EDITED FOR TIMELINES**

2001\. - Henry

Henry comes into his crown at sixteen, after an adolescence of endings. The anniversary of his mother’s death is days before his coronation, and he spends it with Katherine at his side. She mourns as he does; Elizabeth of York was a woman impossible not to love, and the purpose of her death - another son, another heir, another Prince - lies heavy and unspoken between them the same way Arthur’s life and death have since the moment they agreed to be married.

He is alone at his coronation, however; he takes the crown on his own, by himself, isolated from all the moment the holy oil touches his breast.

He was never supposed to be King; raised for the Church until Arthur’s death, Henry closes his eyes and wonders if his father ever thought of what sort of King he might make.

2002\. - Katherine

Katherine is twenty three. Twenty three, and at her second wedding. It feels incredible that her life should change so drastically in five years that they should feel each themselves like decades. She’d only just turned seventeen when she came to England, and he (he, because she feels she cannot even think his name for fear of its implication) was a few years older, and they were both unsure and a little scared and determined to make their parents proud, do their duties by their families and their Countries. She remembers the cold look of his cold father, the unexpected warmth in his mother’s eyes and the stern expressions of encouragement from her own parents. She remembers the contrast between their families, the way none of them seemed to fit quite together; all blonde and fair and English to the dark eyes and olive skin of the Spanish.

It’s different, now she knows them - and by them, she means Henry’s friends. He’s King, now; his mother gone years before, dying in an attempt to give her husband another son, their line another heir. Her baby girl had died along with her, and Katherine remembers the funeral, the absolute misery on the cold King’s face and the way Henry had cried; only fourteen then, desperate to appear a man but still truly a child. It had been a somber echo of the funeral for her young husband only months before. Henry’s father had died two years later; a broken heart, most people said, and she generally couldn’t help but agree - the man had wasted away in the wake of his wife’s death, and Henry’s taking of the crown had been welcome by his people - the changeover of an old, burnt out, tired King to a youthful one that appeared to all a pillar of chivalry and Christendom. The warmth of the welcome was valid; he hadn’t been raised to it, but Henry took to the throne like a fish to water, and his first act had been to propose marriage to her - all romance and chivalry, though she knew he was acting on a childhood crush and the same drive that had his father keeping her in England; money, her dowry, and a prestigious alliance with Spain.

So here they were, standing across from each other at the altar. His crown is a simple gold circlet about his brow and she knows she’ll be given her own in only days, her coronation to follow their marriage before the week is out. He's beautiful, undeniably; of a darker complexion than his brother had been, but much like him, though he had yet to outgrow some of the baby fat at seventeen that Arthur had lost by sixteen.

He's excited, grinning at her as he repeats his vows and slides his ring on her finger, and with the cheers from the witnesses - his ratpack group of friends the loudest, shouting lewd things under the din of the polite company of court - she feels something like hope pressed up under her ribcage.

2003\. - Charles

Charles stands just behind the Royal family on the runway, eyes on the sky along everyone else's, watching the plane approach. On it is the eight year old Queen of Scotland; Mary, daughter of Henry's sister. Charles met her once before; on a visit to Scotland in the then Prince Henry's train. It had been a magnificent thing; the entirety of the English Royal family visiting their oldest daughter and first granddaughter. The infant monarch had been barely walking at the time, toddling around with the help of her mother's fingers and giving them all constant smiles, quickly becoming the love of her relatives with ease. She'd had no concept of her position at the time, though Charles remembers her doing her best to stoically explain to Henry in little-girl lisp that she was the Queen, but not really the Queen, because she wasn't big enough.  
Henry had been enchanted by the little girl; and Charles can see him rocking anxiously on the balls of his feet, now, hands clasped hard behind his back and head tilted up to the sky so the gold circlet he wore almost always about his brow caught the light.

Mary was coming to England for reasons twofold; while her mother had been raised in a Royal household, as a Princess, and educated as such, she'd never been educated as a monarch; so Mary was to be fostered by her Uncle and taught the ways of absolute power - though Charles thought secretly to himself that being taught by a man barely more than a boy himself was somewhat absurd - and second, she was in England for the sake of her safety. In her lifetime, only eight years, there had been three beginnings of rebellion. The first had taken place only days after her birth, when her father had died; she had inherited the crown at six days old, and there had been immediate retaliation from the nobles - she was a girl, not even a week old, and so they'd tried to overthrow the barely present regime. King Henry VII, King before this Henry, had smashed the rebellion to pieces, the full force of the Scottish and English Armies at his back. The next had been when the girl was five and rebels had tried to put Mary's bastard half brother, years older and Protestant, in her place - Henry VII had imprisoned and executed every man he could find that had been involved and forced the adolescent boy to bend the knee to his sister, swear fealty to her and enter the Church - and then betrothed her to the Dauphin, Francis, putting the strength of France behind her as sure as England's. Henry, this Henry, had handled the last one - a single assassin, who'd managed to shoot three of her guards before he was stopped.

It had never been voiced to the public, but Henry had divulged in Charles that he suspected the French despite their alliance - and so Mary was to live here in England, with them, where she could be more closely guarded - and Henry could trust the people around her.

The plane roared as it landed, and Charles took in the stark difference from Henry's. His bore brightly the Tudor rose and coat of arms, the dragon stamped on either side of the tail - a proclamation to all who looked up of who was inside. The Scottish jet was inconspicuous; indistinguishable from any other plane in the sky - the difference between a monarch well loved by his people and secure in his throne and one living in constant fear for her life.

The breath Henry took was audible, and Charles watched him draw himself to full height; shoulders back and chest out. He could practically feel the anxiety radiating off of his friend; anticipating the presence of his elder sister, whom he'd not seen in person in years, who'd yet to see him wearing their father's crown. Charles watched the King’s younger sister’s hand fit itself into the crook of Henry's elbow, and Charles smirked, glancing to the back of her neck and pretending he could see the hickey he’d left there last night under the elaborate hairdo.

The opening of the door of the plane was a bang, stairs revealing themselves to the cold English morning. A length of deep green carpet rolled out and security guards appeared - one, two, three, four; all in black suits, practically marching down the steps and then spreading to stand, two by two.

The little Queen appeared next, and Charles watched Henry's shoulders relax. Charles smiled himself at the little girl; even from the distance, her poise was obvious; shoulders back and head up, in a deep purple dress that hit her ankles. 

Charles wondered how her head did not bow under the weight of the silver crown it carried.

Her mother came behind her and Charles recognized her immediately, from photos and from their childhood together - her hair was a brighter red than any of her siblings, but she bore the same long face and sharp jaw Henry and Mary had, that Arthur had had, and grey eyes that Charles remembered from their mother.  
After that was a procession of girls, between Mary's age and nearly his own, Charles thought, with security interspersed - but he kept his eyes on the young monarch, making her way steadily to rest of her family.

The curtsey she gave was calculated, just low enough to be appropriate deference for the man that was, essentially, Head of her House, but kept her head up; she was, after all, equal to him. Henry returned his own bow, slight as it was, with his wife and sister following his lead just lower on either side of him, and Charles dropped himself, dipping his head down - And then the formality dropped, and Margaret Tudor, Dowager Queen before thirty, was breaking into a smile and a laugh at the sight of her siblings.

 

2003\. - Henry

Henry is standing at his daughter’s crib; has been for hours now, probably, though he’s not sure exactly, too encompassed in watching her chest rise and fall to look at the time. The nannies have assured him repeatedly that she’s all right; just fine, beautiful and healthy - and though they’d never said the same thing about his son, his Prince, he can’t help but mistrust them. So he’s here, in the middle of the night, watching her breathe.

He ought to go to bed. He knows he ought to go to bed; they both ought to - Katherine is asleep in the rocking chair, and he knows she’s more exhausted than she is, the toll on her body much heavier than his own. But they cannot leave her; there are unborn ghosts haunting the palace - haunting their hearts, and it has Katherine's brow knitting in her sleep, Henry's fingers curling to fists like he can fight off the unseen evils, like he can kill sickness, murder Death in his cape.

Mary. Her name is Mary. Named for Henry's elder sister, named for his niece. Mary Tudor; their daughter - their only daughter, their only child. She is tiny, barely bigger than his hand, it seems, at not quite seven pounds. She has a tuft of downy dark hair, a button nose and rosebud lips; almost more a porcelain doll than a person. Henry thinks she looks like him, at the least, like the photos he has in the baby book his mother had so meticulously put together over the course of his childhood - but she seems much more stoic; even now, only days after birth. She is a serious baby; she will be a serious princess, and Henry half smiles, dragging his knuckle lightly against her cheek, plump and pink.

"I love you, my Little Mary," he tells her softly, and she gives a gurgle of a sound in her sleep.

"She's well done, Your Majesty," comes a voice from the side, and Henry lifts his head to find Charles in the doorway. He wonders, idly, how long his friend has been there - it’s nearly three am, by his watch, and the man is in pyjamas and a housecoat, hair a little wild and eyes rimmed dark.

“Charles,” he greets, gives a nod and looks back to the baby, panicked that she’ll have disappeared in the few seconds he hasn’t been watching her.

“You both should sleep,” he says, squeezes Henry’s shoulder, and Henry sighs, giving a nod, even as he reaches into the crib to rest his knuckles against the baby girl’s chest, swaddled in a deep green onesie Henry thought was impossibly small before it fit her perfectly.

“I’m afraid to leave her,” they’ve been married barely two years and had one miscarriage, have lost their boy to what the physicians had called ‘sudden infant death syndrome’ - Henry found it a fancy phrase for we don’t know and the ache of their baby boy, their little Prince, oozes as steadily as a fresh slit to his throat.

“I know, but you’re of no use to her if you’re too dead on your feet to run the country she’ll inherit,” and from anyone else, Henry would rail - the assumption that he and the Queen will have no more children; no son to come after him on the throne, no nursery of bonnie babies like his parents had had before him - but, for a moment, he pictures it. Pictures this tiny baby as a woman, her mother’s height, with his dark hair and the blue eyes they share, the strong Tudor jaw with the round face of Katherine’s family. She wears a deep green dress, adorned in jewels, the seal of state - and the crown atop her head is his, and she is beautiful, and strong, and powerful and everything he’s ever hoped for.

“She’ll be magnificent,” he declares, and he can hear the fever in his own voice with it. Charles claps his shoulder.

“She’s magnificent now,” he agrees, and his hand moves away. “But you ought to go to bed,” he insists, and Henry sighs, nods.

It is in silence that he crosses to his wife, wakes her just enough to shift her from the chair and into his arms, cradling her close to his chest, and they leave the nursery for their bedroom - but by daybreak Henry is back, hand on the baby’s chest in time for her to wake and cry out.

And what a battle cry it is.


End file.
